According to CoinDesk, blockchain projects raised $34.7 million across nine deals in the week spanning the end of October and the start of November. This figure represented a significant cooling compared to the previous week when over $107 million was raised. The week's largest raise saw the Uniswap DAO invest $12 million worth of UNI in StarkNet-based market maker Ekubo Protocol in exchange for a 20% share of governance tokens.
Other significant deals included zero-knowledge AI data verifier Modulus raising $6.3 million led by Variant and 1kx, and zero-knowledge infrastructure provider Toposware receiving $5 million in a seed+ round led by Evolution Equity Partners. Tom Couture, digital asset strategy associate at FundStrat, noted that many decentralized apps (dApps) have been slow to leverage AI due to added security concerns. Modulus aims to solve this issue by leveraging zero-knowledge proofs to efficiently verify that AI providers don’t manipulate their algorithms. As AI continues integrating itself into society, Modulus hopes its cryptographic accountability tools will safeguard the computational future.
AI-powered analytics firm Vaas raised $2 million in pre-seed funding, meaning AI projects accounted for nearly a quarter of the week's total raised. Builders on crypto exchange Coinbase's Base network also attracted capital, with decentralized derivatives protocol Surf raising $3 million seed funding to build its permissionless perpetual decentralized exchange (Perp DEX) on the Ethereum layer 2.
